


Fear of Drowning

by White_Noise



Series: The Casualty of War Series [6]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, Hurt Steve Rogers, M/M, Not A Fix-It, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Post-Civil War (Marvel), Steve is being completely clueless right now, Steve's Pov, What the hell Steve?, no happy ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-10
Updated: 2016-08-10
Packaged: 2018-08-07 22:17:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,144
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7731844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/White_Noise/pseuds/White_Noise
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve had been afraid his whole life. Afraid of being too small to be of use. Afraid when his best friend had been sent off to war and he couldn’t follow. Afraid of the experiment he had committed himself too, just so he could be allowed to fight. Afraid when he heard about the loss of the 107th. Afraid for all the people he was leaving behind when he brought the plane down. He had been afraid when he had woken up from the ice, of this new world he had found himself in. He had been afraid of telling Tony the truth about his parents and ruining their relationship. </p><p>Fear was not weakness. That didn’t mean it couldn’t destroy everything.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fear of Drowning

**Author's Note:**

> Ok, this is honestly a fill chapter for the next story which I am half way through. It's not beta'd and honestly, feeling kinda 'meh' about it but I spent enough time debating over what should go in and decided to cut the whole thing in half. So yep, basically this story serves no point except to get the characters where I want them for the next story.
> 
> Also, sorry for taking so long to get another story up. Work and all that. (Updated a little bit because I posted this at 1am and missed a few little mistakes)

The Wakandan Royal Palace was a beautiful building, surrounded by lush jungle, the building itself hanging precariously on a cliff overlooking a huge waterfall. The roar of falling water filled the building, like the roar of the Panther which was the pride of the small country and the symbol of its king. 

To Steve Rogers, the roar of the water was both a soothing noise and a nightmare. Soothing because water was something clean. Back during the war, Steve and his team had been surrounded by blood and dirt, never able to clean themselves unless they were lucky enough to find a large body of water. To have enough water meant clean clothes, clean skin and something to drink. Along with food, water had been one of the most important resources soldiers on the front line could have. 

At the same time, water made Steve nervous. It was a reminder of so many bad things. Of crashing the HYDRA plane into the ocean, his goodbye to Peggy, his best girl, still on his lips. Of falling into the Potomac, the SHIELD helicarrier falling to pieces around him, Bucky’s confused face branded into his memory as his best friend fought for control. 

It also, in many ways reminded him of Tony. Of Tony’s fears of water and drowning, from his torture at the hands of the Ten Rings and his fall into the ocean during the Mandarins first attack. His terror of drowning. 

Both the Tower and the Compound had been equipped with large recreational swimming pools. It had taken the team a long time to realise that, despite it being his building, those were the only rooms Tony would never set foot in. Even a recreational swim was too much for the genius. 

At first, the team had let themselves believe it had something to do with the arc reactor in Tony’s chest. Something to do with electrical devices not mixing with water. But after Tony had the reactor removed and still refused to set foot in the room, the secret had finally come out. 

Steve remembered one night, several years into their friendship and early in their relationship, when Tony’s insomnia had reached a peak. Steve himself hadn’t needed much sleep and had been awake, sitting in the common room of the Tower and casually sketching. It had been 4am in the morning when he had been brought out of his thoughts as Tony had arrived in the room. The genius had been sweating and shaking and it had taken Steve a lot of persuasion to get the dark haired man to open up. A night terror, something which Steve was very familiar with, had been the cause of Tony’s recent bout of insomnia and it seemed, the reason his small nap had been disturbed. The genius, after almost 5 days of no sleep, had fallen into a stress dream where he had been drowning, with no way to save himself. 

Steve, already feeling somewhat guilty at not being there for Tony during the Mandarin incident (he had been with Sam, looking into a false sighting of Bucky at the time) had done his best to comfort the genius, even going so far as to promise Tony that he would not let him go through that again. 

But time had made a liar of Steve Rogers. 

Steve hadn’t wanted to hear of the details of Tony’s death on the court house steps. Yet it seemed that everywhere he turned, the images of his lover dying were there, on those cold stone steps in front of the court house.

The trial too, had been all over the place and even in an isolated place like Wakanda, it had been big news. Steve had tried to avoid it as much as he could but it had proved impossible. Especially when his worst fear had been confirmed. 

The official cause of Tony’s death had not been blood loss from his injuries but Hypoxia brought on by a fluid build-up in his lungs after one of the bullets had pierced the left side of his chest, just below his heart. Tony had drowned in his own blood in front of the world.

The geniuses fear had been realised and Steve had not been there to protect him. 

The soothing noise of the waterfall was no longer a comfort.

Standing before the edge, on the special made balcony that connected to the small lounge of the apartments T’Challa had gifted to the homeless Avengers, Steve couldn’t help but look at the rushing water, thinking back on that night, half a world away, where Tony had opened up to him in one of his rare moments of weakness. No, not weakness. Tony Stark had never been weak. 

Being afraid wasn’t weak. 

Steve had been afraid his whole life. Afraid of being too small to be of use. Afraid during those awful date nights Bucky had dragged him too with dames who never looked twice at the scrawny man. Afraid when his best friend had been sent off to war and he couldn’t follow. Afraid of the Peggy, in a way and the experiment he had committed himself too, just so he could be allowed to fight. Afraid when he heard about the loss of the 107th and his inevitable task to sneak into a HYDRA base. Afraid of all the people he was leaving behind when he brought the plane down into the ocean rather than let it hit its target. He had been afraid when he had woken up from the ice, of this new world he had found himself in. He had been afraid of telling Tony the truth about his parents and ruining the only solid relationship he had ever had. 

Fear was not weakness. That didn’t mean it couldn’t destroy everything. 

Absentmindedly, Steve gripped the black flip phone still in his pocket. Sam had said it was proof of denial, of Steve’s grief holding onto the device after all that had happened, yet Steve could not bring himself to throwing it away. He knew that it would never ring, that the owner of its partner was gone. Yet the idea of throwing it away, like the phone didn’t mean anything, was too much for the soldier. Even after Tony’s letter from beyond the grave, not so subtly criticising the device, Steve couldn’t let the cheap piece of plastic go.

Instead, he kept it by his side. Every night, he plugged it in to charge next to his bed and every morning, it found its way into a pocket to be carried around with him. Sometimes, Steve even woke up during the night, imagining that the phone was ringing before the silence, the soft rumble of the waterfall reminded him of where he was and what had happened. 

Leaning against the railing above the rushing water, Steve pulled the phone out of his pocket and placed it down on the metal surface, his eyes scanning the green horizon. 

It had been 6 weeks now since Tony’s death. Steve had not heard anything since T’Challa’s return from America, refusing to even watch the news after Tony’s funeral. The rest of the team had followed suit, turning off all sources of information, isolating themselves further. No one wanted to hear what was going on now. No one wanted to accept what had happened, that the one man who they had all secretly been relying on to get them home was gone. Because, as much as none of them wanted to accept it, the others knew that Tony had a hand in the accords and an in with the UN that no one had truly appreciated before. He had been the only one with the power, the means and the will to get the charges dropped. Had truly been the only one who could help them get home safe. (Steve had yet to find the courage to tell the others what had really happened in Siberia, what Tony had learnt. He felt like if he did, the others would realise that had the genius survived, he would never had helped them. Not after what Steve had done)

It didn’t matter now, what was going on in the US. All that mattered was keeping safe until they could go home, if they ever could go home. Steve knew that his team mates were struggling. Scott and Clint were both fathers and being cut off from their families was a torment. Clint too was missing Natasha. The spy, despite being on their side by the end of the confrontation, had not appeared in Wakanda, no doubt finding her own place to hide from Ross. Steve could see that Wanda was missing Vision and her weekly trips to her brother’s grave, the odd normality of living in the Compound after her turbulent early years had now been ripped away from her. Even Sam, who hadn’t been able to really adjust to daily life and connect after his war service seemed to miss the US and the freedoms he had once enjoyed. And Steve, Steve missed the place he had called home, the Compound and before that, the Tower. The places where Tony Stark was.

That was why the information he had been given that morning was so startling. 

A representative from Stark Industry was on their way to the country for some sort of trade discussion with T’Challa. Probably to do with that piece of technology the Wakandan scientists had invented, the Binarily Augmented Retro Framing Tech which was being used to help Bucky break the HYDRA conditioning. No doubt the board of Stark Industry were interested in purchasing the tech from Wakanda and given T’Challa’s good relationship with Tony before his death, were using that to gain access to the closed off country. That made sense to Steve. What didn’t make sense was the other request. 

The Avengers had been asked to attend the meeting. 

Steve didn’t know why the request had been made, nor who was going to be the representative. Ideally, he thought it would have to be Pepper Potts, the sharp minded businesswoman who had been Tony’s former partner and CEO of his company. But that couldn’t be possible. Steve knew very little about running a company, only half listening whenever Tony spoke about his duties to the company his father had built, but he did know that Stark Industry would have been busy after Tony’s murder. It wouldn’t make sense for Pepper to come to Wakanda during such a volatile time. 

At least, Steve hoped it wouldn’t be Pepper. Steve was not sure how he could go, facing the woman, Tony’s friend and his ex who was no doubt still hurting. Pepper was a force to be reckoned with at the best of times and Steve did not want to face her. Not yet anyway. 

The request was also worrying because no one should have even known where the Avengers were hiding. Steve had worked hard to make sure that the letter and phone he had sent had been untraceable and T’Challa had said he hadn’t told Tony where they were. Steve trusted the king to be a man of his words. Although Tony had admitted he knew the team were in Wakanda in his own letter, Steve knew the genius had been working off a theory and had no actual proof of their whereabouts. He also hoped that Tony hadn’t told Ross of his former friends suspected whereabouts before he died. Because if he did, who was to stop the man from breaking diplomatic ties just to send another death squad after the Avengers? He had done it before.

The request was worrying to Steve. Had they been found out? Had someone betrayed their location to the government? Was this a ploy to arrest them? Could Steve protect Bucky and Wanda from persecution and stop Sam, Clint and Scott from being sent back to jail?

Steve didn’t know. 

Sighing, Steve looked down at the phone, wishing that it would ring. Wishing that this was all a nightmare and was about to end. That Tony was on the other end of the line, maybe still mad at Steve but alive and unharmed. 

Under his feet, the water continued to fall. 

“Steve?” 

Steve turned to face Sam, who was standing at the door, looking over at him.

“They’re here.” The other soldier said before turning and entering the room, heading towards the private helicopter landing pad on the roof of the palace. Steve signed. Sam hadn’t mentioned who ‘they’ were but Steve could guess. Stark Industry representatives had arrived.

Out of habit, he slipped the phone back into his pocket. Turning his back to the beautiful scene, the Soldier squared his shoulder and tried to prepare for whatever would happen next. It was time to finally face reality.

**Author's Note:**

> Bet you all know who's coming to Wakanda. Next story will be Steve's team finally facing some certain people, learning about what the new Accords actually entail and maybe finally learning about what Steve is hiding from them about Siberia. (It isn't going to go down well)
> 
> I know it seems from this story that I really don't like Steve Rogers. In reality, I adore Steve and was actually Team Cap during the CW comics. I just hate Evens version of him. They seemed to focus too much on the look and the wholesome apple pie, good guy pieces of Steve's personality but never got the smart, tactical side. And the few times they tried to show Caps dark, manipulative side (and he does have a dark side) it was just poorly handled, especially when trying to play off RDJs Tony. It made them both look like bickering children, the only saving grace was RDJ could actually justify it and make it work with his version Tony while Evens couldn't.
> 
> His military skills also rub me the wrong way, being a member of the military myself. I have worked under good Commanding Officers and bad ones and MCU verse Steve is one of the worst CO's I could ever imagine, if CW didn't make that clear enough. He literally pushed his team into dropping their whole lives and risking everything for a political movement which made no sense and the protection of one man who didn't even want to be involved in the first place and refused to see any sort of compromise during the multiple times he was approached by the other side. That is not the traits of a good leader, that is the traits of a asshole who gets his mates killed. I would never want to follow someone like Steve into battle because I have no confidence that he would be working for everyone's best interests and doing what he could to keep everyone alive.


End file.
